Untitled Sermon (2)

We’re continuing our series in Joshua tonight so please find a Bible somewhere near you, and come back with me to .

There are many Famous Last Words in history. Maybe the most curious was by John Sedgewick. He was a General in America, a Union Commander. In 1864, he was looking over the battle scene, apparently his last words were pointing at the enemy, “Don’t be stupid, at that range, they couldn’t hit a ____.”

Given that terrible misjudgement of eyesight, perhaps it was appropriate that he was shot in his eye.

The Bible records many famous last words. But not to amuse us. In the Bible, people give their most important messages at the end of their lives. Jacob, Moses, Joshua, David, and of course our Lord Jesus Christ.

At the end of Joshua’s life, he gave two farewell speeches. His second one is the next chapter, 24. That one’s for the whole nation and more formal, like Joshua’s state of the union address.

But our one tonight is the first speech to Israel’s leaders.

It’s much more intimate, like a fireside gathering. So The elders gather in round to hear Joshua’s personal and passionate team talk as he hands them the baton.

V1-2 set the scene but you really need to feel the weight of this occasion. So picture the scene I’m going to paint for you using the context and some imagination.

Imagine you’re a Middle eastern man, with a big family and a big beard. You’ve many scars from years of fighting. But as v1 says, after a long time, the Lord had given Israel rest from all their enemies around them.

God’s re-establishing the garden of Eden in this land, a new and mini Eden, where peace and justice would reign. All families of the earth would be blessed through our land– all nations would be saved through Israel. You’ve divied up the land and started building your houses in peace.

But v1 continues Joshua’s by now old and well advanced in years, v2 He summoned all Israel – their elders, leaders, judges and officials.

You’d spent a long day in the fields with your labourers when a young lad runs up to you with the following message: our great leader Yeshua ben Nun is dying and summons you to for his final will and testament. You quickly gather your things and make your way across the plains. With the glorious sun in the sky, you laugh to yourself as you remember how Joshua’d defeated mighty nations, wrestled from them this precious strip of land with such weak men in his army.

But as the day comes to dusk, darkness descends on your mind. Like we all do when we come to a big transition, your thoughts wander… What’ll future hold without your beloved leader, Joshua? What if instead us bringing salvation to all nations, these nations destroy us? What’ll happen to me and my family?

You arrive, I imagine, to a roaring bonfire and the elders chattering among themselves. What will Joshua say?

Then, An eerie hush…as Joshua opens his mouth to speak…

Look at verse 3.

You yourselves have seen everything the Lord your God has done to all these nations for your sake; it was the Lord your God who fought for you. 4 Remember how I’ve allotted as an inheritance for your tribes all the land of the nations that remain—the nations I conquered—between the Jordan and the Great Sea in the west.

Now that’s a bit confusing isn’t it? Because God’s fulfilled every single promise already, he’s given them the land. But why’s he saying they still need to take it? How does that fit?

Well the house next door to where we live was sold last year to new owners. The land was given to them, keys exchanged. Promises fulfilled. It was theirs.

But for months even though it’d been given to them, they didn’t settle in the property. There was still old stuff left from the previous guys. And..their parking lot had randomers come park there. Because the new owners hadn’t cleared them away yet.

And that’s what happening with Israel. The land’s been given to them, the keys exchanged, but they haven’t actually settled much of it. There’s still large parts of the property with old stuff left it in that they haven’t cleared out. And other people are camping out in their parking spaces because they haven’t been cleared away.

But for all that, did you get Joshua’s main point? Look with me at verse 5:

5 The Lord your God himself will drive them out of your way. He’ll push them out before you, and you’ll take possession of their land, as the Lord your God promised you.

1) Pour over the promises of God (v3-5).

God’s promises are the theme of our passage tonight. We’ve just seen it in verse 5, but Joshua repeats it again in v10, then again 3 times in v14. Then again in v15.

He says pour over the promises of God.

But also, did you notice how many times the word LORD appeared in our passage?

When LORD is in capital letters like that, it means God’s personal name is used – YHWH. The God who makes covenants and promises. I counted 17 times in the Hebrew. God’s covenant name occurs more often than there are verses!

Again and again Joshua emphasises the covenant God. Cling to this God and his promises.

But wait aren’t these all God’s promises to Israel. How does any of this apply to me?

Well …in one way or another, all of this applies to you. Because says all the promises of God are yes and amen in Christ! In Jesus, all of these promises are for you too.

God promised to bless all nations through this land. Though Israel failed but God still did exactly that. See God came to live among us, when he defeated sin and death once and for all, when he brought salvation for all nations, he did here, in this land, in Jerusalem. Just as he promised.

And today his promise to us believers isn’t just one little bit of land in the middle east, but get this – our promised land is the new Eden, the newcreation, a renewed world. That’s our inheritance, that’s God’s promise to us. So all of these promises are yours in Christ.

But why does Joshua focus on God’s promises? Why is this so important?

How often in transitions do we look anywhere else for security …but none can be found. The greatest threat is that you’ll forget the one thing on which you can depend– the promises of God.

When you come to the end of your life, you’ll never regret depending on his promises.

This has personal resonance for me. A few years ago, my last living grandparent passed away, my grandpa aged 90. But a few months before he died we had a big celebration for his 90th birthday. And naturally Grandpa wanted to say a few words. But what would he say? Do you know the main message Grandpa had for us? God is always faithful. Even though we’re so often unfaithful, he is always faithful. It’s a beautiful thing to be able to testify to the faithfulness and promises of God at the end of your life, like Joshua, Like Grandpa.

I have to say I love Joshua’s picture of God in verse 3. He pictures not a sleazy politician making promises, or someone like who so often breaks his promises. He pictures a warrior God. Who fights for us, who fights to keep his promises. The divine warrior. That’s our God!

Did you know that “Promises drive the actions of our Warrior God.”

This side of the cross how much more can we say that God’s fought for us in Christ? The last enemy to be defeated is death. Our Warrior Jesus Christ destroyed it in his death and resurrection.

So how has Warrior God fought for you in Jesus? How’s he fought for you in your life?

Well I wonder are you prone to forget how he’s fought for you, and how he’s kept his promises. Are you like the Israelites who forget within a few chapters have forgotten by ? What can you do to make them more central in your life?

Why not…Write them on the doorframes of your house. Memorise them and recite them when you lie down and when you get up. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road. Impress them on your children., Those are Moses’ ideas for application from DEut 6.

Now let’s really work this into our hearts. Let’s get the balm of God’s promises and really work them into our hearts tonight.

Are you discouraged tonight about the state of the church around you? Jesus promises you: “I will build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it”.

“Jesus says where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am also.”

God says My word will not return to me empty

Do you wonder whether God can really forgive what you’ve done, how you’ve failed him?

if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Do you often suffer from profound loneliness?

He says, “I will never leave you, never will I forsake you.”

“Behold I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” .

Do you wonder if you can keep going, worn down by long-term attritional suffering?

Jesus says to you, come to me all who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. .

He says, Behold! I’m coming soon. And I will wipe every tear from your eyes. & 22.

So Joshua’s first instruction - Pour over the promises of God.

(BREAK)

Well does that mean I can just stay in bed all day because well it’s all about what God’s promised to do? It’s his promises so I can stay under the duvet. Doesn’t matter if I steer off course or shrink back.

Well see what Joshua says in verse 6: “Be very strong; be careful to obey all that is written in the Book of the Law of Moses, without turning to the right or to the left.”

The exact words spoken to Joshua in ch1, he now passes on to his leaders. But he gets more specific in verse 7: Don’t associate with these nations that remain among you;

What’s with this stuff about not associating and not marrying people from other nations? Well it’s not an ethnic issue, because we’ve seen Rahab, her family, the Gibeonites and more from the nations, join Israel. Warmly welcomed into the community. So what is the issue? Keep reading:

do not invoke the names of their gods or swear by them. You must not serve them or bow down to them. 8 But you are to hold fast to the Lord your God.

It’s not an ethnic issue it’s a worship issue.

Don’t be seduced by the gods, the idols of the surrounding culture. Don’t enter into relationships with people who don’t worship your God. Don’t conduct your relationships the way the world does.

You’re called to be different.

Joshua’s second point is Prioritise the worship of God. V6-12.

Now if we’re honest we struggle with the idea of worshipping today don’t we? Why should I bow before anyone else? No one has authority over me.

Let me read you something by an incredibly insightful non-Christian, an award-winning writer called David Foster Wallace: There’s no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship. And an outstanding reason for choosing a God like Yahweh to worship is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive.

If you worship money and things — if they’re your meaning in life — then you’ll never have enough. Never.

Worship your beauty or sex and you’ll always feel ugly, and when time and age start showing, you’ll die a million deaths before they finally plant you.

Worship power — you’ll fear weakness. And you’ll need ever more and more power over others to keep the fear at bay.

Worship your intellect, being seen as smart — you’ll end up feeling stupid, a fraud, and always on the verge of being found out.”

Joshua completely agrees. Please notice something very important in verse 8 – you’re to hold fast to the LORD your God. Hold fast there is the strongest adhesive word in the Hebrew. Cling, cleave, stick to, glue yourself to the LORD your God.

BUT… get this! The same word’s in verse 12 to describe allying, or clinging to the those who worship idols, sticking to idols.

So it’s not a choice between worshipping God or not worshipping, sticking to God or being independent. If you don’t stick to God, then you’ll still find yourself glued but this time to false gods, to idols.

So what are the idols of our surrounding culture that tempt you? What are the gods that you’re chasing after right now?

But isn’t it fascinating what Joshua goes back to in verse 10? There’s the warrior God…there’s the promises of God. And the result of them? The love of God.

How goes back to our beginning theme. And do you get what he’s saying?

God’s promises fuel our worship. You will worship God to the extent that you cling to his promises over the false promises of idols.

(We could add love God, obey God, cling to God…)

This is how it works. (CHUNK, BUILD UPWARDS) You cling to God’s promises, which means you worship him instead of idols, then love and obedience.

But if you forget his promises, you’ll fall for the false promises. You worship idols, and become more and more disobedient. That’s how it works.

Let me illustrate this for you. I love the film Interstellar by Christopher Nolan. It traces a father who has to leave his daughter for the length of his life, possibly never to return again. But he promises her I will come back.

And years later in one of the most moving moments I’ve ever seen, he finally returns. With a beautiful score by Hans Zimmerman in the background.

He’s daughter now old, in hospital, on her death bed. He says I came back for you and tears are streaming down both their faces.

And she says I knew you’d come back, no-one believed me, but I knew you’d come back. And he says how?

She stops and says…because my dad promised me.

That’s what this looks like. Cling to the promises of your Father and you’ll trust him and worship and obey him. Jesus says I am coming soon I’ll wipe every tear, I’ll put everything to rights, so keep going. Stick with me. Don’t let me go.

Well let’s get practical now. Let’s take the case study that Joshua highlights. Christians will always be tempted to be like the world in our relationships, in our marriages, in our sexuality.

Meet Jessica. She’d love to be in a relationship and a non-Christian colleague at work is interested in her, has been flirting with her and they’ve been texting.

Before you send that message which you know is inappropriate…or before you go on that website you keep going to, ask yourself, what are these things promising me?

Are they promising to satisfy me? To solve my problems? Identify the promises.

And then, just as you would a dodgy car salesman, start questioning those promises. Let’s be a bit skeptical and interrogate those false promises by asking, “If this promises to satisfy, then why do I have to keep coming back to them? Why do I find myself here again and again if it ever worked? If it’ll solve my problems, why do I just have a whole new set of problems instead, but now with regret added as well?”

Identify the false promises you’re believing, interrogate them, and then ask what has God promised me instead? Pour over the promises of God.

Here’s one glorious promise about purity.

– “Blessed are the pure, for they will see God.” That is one of the most beautiful promises in Scripture. A promise to build your life on. A promise you can lean on and use to drive out the impure idols in your heart.

God’s promises fuel our worship. You will worship God to the extent that you cling to his promises instead of the false promises of idols.

Joshua’s second message: prioritise the worship of God.

(PAUSE)

But is idolatry really that bad? Is it really that bad for my relationships to be like the world, marriage to be like the world’s marriages?

I wonder if you noticed something strange towards the end of our passage tonight. The beginning was optimistic with God’s promises. Now the music turns to a minor key.

Verse 13: These relationships and idols’ll become snares and traps for you. They’ll be whips on your backs and thorns in your eyes.

That imagery’s like a horror film.

But it gets worse. Look how it ends in verse 16: “If you violate the covenant of the Lord your God which he commanded you, go and serve other gods and bow down to them, the Lord’s anger’ll burn against you, and you’ll quickly perish from the good land he’s given you.”

Joshua’s third point and final point is: prepare for the judgement of God (and this v14-16, though it overlaps with the previous section.)

Do you remember house next door to us, the new owners? Well because they didn’t settle their property, a few weeks ago we started to seeing randomers congregate outside the house. And it started becaming clear that squatters had moved in to their land their property. And it actually became a den of criminals. The police were called numerous and the place was hell-hole. And that’s exactly what God is saying will happen to Israel. This is how it works: They forget God’s promises, worship idols, judgement and curse.

Strange ending for a motivational last speech isn’t it?

Can you imagine going to a motivation speech on giving up smoking, the beginning’s good but by the end the guy just says, well you can’t do it really can you. You’ll keep smoking, and then you’ll be dead.

But Joshua wants to wake us up tonight with a sharp warning. A threat really.

If you refuse to root out the idols in your life, if you resist God to the end, then you will face judgement.

So if nothing you’ve heard tonight has concerned you about your idols, if nothing’s touched you, then watch out. WAKE UP. God’s anger burns against those who don’t listen to his warnings.

The self-sufficient the proud will suffer an eternity without God in hell.

But you ask, how is that fair?

Cast your eyes over v15: “But just as every good promise of the LORD your God has come true, so the LORD will bring on you all the evil he’s threatened.”

Did you know that promises also drive God’s judgement. He’s promised justice, and justice means that moral crimes are punished. He’s promised a new creation without sin, so his promises require sin to be purged.

So our question now must be, is there any hope for us? Any hope for an idolater like me?

The answer seems to be no.

Do you remember the many last speeches I mentioned in the Bible? They all follow the same pattern: at the end, future prediction of exile, curse, judgement. And the last word of the Old testament, literally, is the word curse.

But there is one ray of hope in the Bible’s last words. Jacob’s last speech says there’s hope in one tribe – the tribe of Judah.

And when we come to the New Testament, we hear the glorious announcement, the lion from the tribe of Judah has come , and his name is Jesus Christ.

But how does Jesus deal with this judgement of God?

Well (TURN?) this glorious verse from tell us:

13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law (how?) by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: “Cursed is everyone who’s hung on a tree.”

What a masterplan – the Son of God takes God’s judgement and our curse on himself.

Oh and it overwhelms me when I read Jesus literally suffered whips on his back and thorns in your eyes as he wore the crown of thorns. But the difference was he didn’t suffer that for his own idolatry but for mine. And for yours.

And what’s the result of him taking my curse? The next verse says:

14 He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit.[1]

Friends this is glorious good news that Jesus brings us tonight. Because he took the promised curse, we get the promised blessing, the eternal promised land, a place in the new creation.

So when Jesus gives his farewell speech in , he makes no negative prediction of the future. Instead he predicts that the HS will live in us keep us going until the end.

So that’s Joshua’s final point Prepare for the judgement of God. How? By fleeing to Jesus. Trust him and he takes the curse and judgement in your place.

So Pour over the Promises of God. Prioritise the worship of God. Prepare for the judgement of God.

Let me close by telling you the how this worked out in the famous last words of one other great leader. Dr Martyn Lloyd Jones was perhaps the greatest preacher of the 20th century. Throughout his Christian life and ministry, he poured over the promises of God. So By the end of his life he was prepared for the judgement of God and eager to worship him forever. And as he lay on his deathbed, in his final hours, those close to him started praying for a miracle, for a remarkable recovery. He could no longer speak but he just wrote the words “don’t hold me back from the glory”.

(SILENCE)

O Lord our God, may that be the longing of all our hearts tonight. Delight us with your promises. Convince us that you are a Warrior God. By your Spirit Help us to respond to all you’ve done with worship. Keep us from idols we pray, we want to stick to you and hold fast to you Father.

And we pray that every person in this room will prepare for that coming judgement day. That we’d take refuge in your Son, who took the curse so we could get the promised blessing and an eternal inheritance.

We pray all this in his name, Amen.